Winds of Change
by Cyler Fharzhide
Summary: The night before the unveiling of Su's latest invention, Motoko has a peculiar dream...
1. Prologue: Premonition

Author note: This is testing the waters, so to speak. To see if anyone's interested. I have one chapter of this (aside from this prologue) written. Which I'll like as not upload pretty soon. Like I said, just to see how people react. And, uh, anyone who's waiting for the next installment of my Harry Potter**  
**fic...er...yeah, I'm totally still working on that? I just have seriously bad writer's block for that right now. Sorry. Apologies muchly. Really.

**Prologue - Premonition**

_**Help us.**_

Motoko woke with a start, momentarily disoriented by the oddness of her dream. She sat up, her blanket pooling around her waist, and looked around her room. Everything was as it should be, but Motoko could not shake the feeling that something just wasn't right. She closed her eyes, shaking her head once, and then stood. She left her room quietly, the time being well after midnight, and made her way to the balcony where she trained.

As she leaned against the railing, eyes closed and the cool night breeze blowing through her hair, she attempted to piece together the images and fragments of thoughts left behind by the peculiar dream.

She'd been suspended in some sort of multicolored space, seemingly floating in nothingness yet with the sensation of standing firmly on a solid surface. As she looked around, she had been joined by three... "presences". Motoko could think of no other word to describe them. They had been shaped vaguely humanoid, but were definitely feminine, that much had been easy to discern. Their "bodies" gave off and ethereal glow that masked their "faces".

For what seemed like an eternity, the four of them were frozen in place. The three presences in front of Motoko, one directly, and the other two each slightly to either side.

Motoko wanted to speak, to ask what was happening, but could not find her voice to do so. Anything that would be said then, it seemed, would be spoken by the presences. And they did speak, and their voices had been one of the most beautiful things Motoko had ever heard. The words were in a language she could not understand, but she nonetheless knew what was being said.

_**He needs your help.**_

_**All of you.**_

_**We need you.**_

_**Please...**_

_**Help us.**_

At that point, the glow surrounding their bodies took on individual colors: red in the middle, green to her right, and blue to her left. There had been a flash, and a glimpse of some kind of geometric shape followed by a view of a vast open plain. Then Motoko had awoken.

Now, out on the balcony in her nightlothes in the middle of the night, Motoko was wondering what it meant. Who were those...presences? Who was the "he" that they had mentioned? Keitaro? And why did they, whoever "they" were, need _her _help?

Motoko shook her head again, The only explanation she could come up with was that maybe she had eaten something odd, or her subonscious was picking up things from watching television or conversations she'd had. Either way, she needed to get back to sleep.

Considering Su was showcasing some kind of new invention in the morning, Motoko figured she was going to need all the sleep she could get.


	2. A New Journey Begins

**Chapter 1: A New Journey Begins**

Motoko awoke for the second time that morning feeling far more refreshed than she believed she should. The events of the night were still fresh in her memory, though she did not dwell upon them. During her morning training session, however, the memories of the presences infused her with a warm, calm feeling. It was a sensation that boosted her performance and made her feel as if she wasn't as tired as she normally was after her workout.

Now, relaxing in the hot spring before Shinobu called them to breakfast, Motoko was only slightly irritated when Keitaro went flying through the roof and arced over towards the ruin of the annex. She sighed contentedly and sank lower in the water.

A few moments later, Naru stormed into the bathing area, preceded by her angry aura, and began to clean herself. Motoko gave her a wide berth, for from the manner of complaints she was uttering, Naru was in no mood to be hassled.

"Stupid pervert," she muttered, scrubbing angrily at a nonexistent spot on her arm. "Thinks just because we're going out now he can cop a feel whenever he wants. Hmmph."

Motoko kept her comments to herself. It was no longer her business what Naru and Keitaro did together. Ingoring the pang that caused, she thought _Should he trespass upon Shinobu-chan or the others, however..._

She looked up at the sound of Naru sloshing into the water. Though she still wore an expression of anger, Motoko could sense her temper cooling rapidly. Motoko smiled in spite of herself. Her friends had a very strange relationship indeed.

"What are you smiling about?" Naru demanded, only pretending to be angry at this point.

"It's nothing. You make an odd pair."

Naru blushed and hunched her shoulders as she sank lower into the water. "It really hasn't quite sunk in yet, y'know?" She gazed at Motoko expectantly.

Motoko looked away and did not answer right away. _Even tough you two are always trying to suck each other's faces off?_ Surprised at the stab of jealousy coupled with the ferocity of the thought, Motoko felt ashamed. She sighed and looked up at the sky.

"What's the matter, Motoko-chan?"

Motoko shook her head. _I must focus._ "I'm just slightly apprehensive about Su-chan's new invention."

Naru brought her knees up and hugged them to her chest. "I know what you mean. She's been so energetic about this one that we can't help but feel nervous."

Motoko nodded. They continued to make small talk until Shinobu called them to breakfast. The meal passed in the same manner as was normal for the Hinata House, though Keitaro and Naru didn't react with the same embarrassment to Kitsune's teasing as they normally did.

The young swordswoman greatly enjoyed the feeling of peace permeating the walls of the old inn. This was her home, even more so than the God's Cry Shool in Kyoto. Thinking of the dojo made her shudder involuntarily. Sooner or later, Tsuruko was going to find out that Motoko had failed her Toudai entrance exam, and there would be hell to pay when that time came.

As they proceeded as a group towards Su's room, Motoko continued to dwell on her feelings of dread. She should have told her sister right away that she had not succeeded at passing her entrance exam, but had at the time not wanted anyone to find out that she had been trying. She would be regretting that decision soon, Motoko was quite sure.

She broke out of her reverie as Su began her demonstration. The foreign girl had cleared out a section of her jungle to make space for a large machine. The machine itself consisted of two large pods, large enough to stand in, connected by a panel of dials and readouts that Motoko assumed to be some kind of control system. The pods each bore Su's three-eye emblem.

Su stood in front of the controls, grinning like a madman and wearing a pair of tinted goggles on her forehead. She gave a theatrical bow as she greeted them. "Howdy, folks! Welome to Kaolla's Super Spectacular Teleporter-thingy Extraordinaire!" She spread her arms wide, indicating the contraption she stood before.

Everyone sweatdropped. "Te...teleporter...thingy?" Keitaro asked a little bit apprehensively.

Su nodded emphatically. "Right-o, Kay-trow!" She jumped sideways to stand in front of the left pod. "You step in this baby here..." She moved back to the controls. "...I set'er up right here..." She jumped to the right pod. "...and ZAP! Yer over here!" She peeled a banana that she'd pulled from out of nowhere and she grinned at them. "Which one of yas wants ta try it first?"

Everyone but Keitaro took one step back.

"Keitaro, yer such a great guy, ya so-and-so!" Su went up and took his arm to drag him up to the left pod.

"Eh?"

"Don'cha worry 'bout a thing! All ya gots ta do is stand there." Su stepped back to the controls. "Ready, Keitaro?"

"Ehh??"

"Full Power!! Switch On!!" She pressed a button marked with her three-eyed symbol.

"UAAAAAAAAAHH!!"

There was a flash of light and a puff of smoke, and then Keitaro was standing on the right pod, looking somewhat disheveled. He stepped down and promptly fell to his knees. "Oh, good Lord, I'm glad that's over..."

Naru came forward as he stood up again. "Don't be such a wuss." She turned toward the first pod. "If you can do it, I'm sure _anyone _can." She moved towards it, but Keitaro stopped her by grabbing her arm.

"Wait, Naru, I don't think you should--"

She silenced him by Judo-tossing him, then stepped onto the pod. "Let's do this, Su-chan."

"Aw, snap!" Su yelled.

Unfortunately, Naru had managed to hurl Keitaro directly into the control panel. It sparked and crackled menacingly, and was obviously quite broken.

"Hold on ta yer meatbuns!" Su put on her goggles.

The pod activated and Naru disappeared. Before anyone could react, eletricity arced between the pods and some sort of portal appeared suspended in the air. Naru was inside, completely terrified. "Keitaro!!" she cried, and then faded away. The gateway remained.

"Naru!!" Keitaro leaped for the opening, but Motoko grabbed him. "Let me go! Naru!!"

"Urashima, you don't know what may happen!" she pleaded.

"I don't care! NARU!!"

A complexity of swirling emotions flooded through Motoko's mind.

_She's gone, your chance is now._

_Keitaro's going to go mad._

_Is Naru-senpai going to be alright?_

_What's going to happen to this place if he does not return?_

_**We must rescue her.**_

It was Keitaro's turn to plead. "Motoko-chan! Please!!"

Motoko stared at him for a moment before she made her decision. "Su-chan. Find out how to bring us back." Holding Keitaro's arm, she jumped into the opening. As the jungle in Su's rooms faded from view, she head the girl call "Roger!"

Then Motoko was overwhelmed by the intensity of the light inside the gateway and slipped from consciousness.

- -

Motoko's eyes fluttered open to the soft sounds of birds twittering. She was lying on her back, staring through the leaves of a fairly large tree, mid-morning light filtering through and leaving dappled shadows in the soft earth. She sat up abruptly, senses on high alert. She turned her head and peered around. "Urashima?" She jumped to her feet. "Urashima!"

Motoko spun around, stretching her senses to their limits, scanning in every direction for any sign of Keitaro. To her dismay, she could find no sign of him, and even worse, she could sense nothing of any kind. The ki signatures of the forest seemed to be completely masked, it was like she'd been blinded.

She froze at the sound of something moving through the underbrush. In her panicky attempt to scan her surroundings, she'd forgotten to mask her own presence. Now she had to assume she had attracted something that could turn out to be hostile.

And when the source of the sound stepped through a particularly thick stand of bushes, bending them aside as if they were little more than mere garden shrubs, Motoko found that she was quite correct. Bipedal, heavily muscled, and easily twice the height and many times the weight of the young woman, the creature came into view, brandishing a large spear. It peered down at her over its porcine snout, and Motoko took a step back involuntarily. It grunted, and as it did so it raised it's spear slightly.

The samurai girl stared back without blinking. She shifted her weight, lowered her center of gravity, and placed her hand on the hilt of her sword. A bead of sweat rolled down the side of her face, and the level of tension in her muscles increased.

The creature growled, and with amazing speed that almost caught Motoko off guard, it swung its spear in a great lateral arc that she was barely able to react to. She released the tension she'd been storing in her legs, launching herself forward and barely clearing the blade of the spear as it passed beneath.

A torrent of leaves, twigs and earth flew into the air, surrounding Motoko as she sped towards the target. The creature's great, ugly face loomed closer and closer; Motoko struck, her sword creating a crescent of reflected light.

It was done in less than a second. The spear thudded in the dirt and the body collapsed in a puff of dust. Motoko stood facing away from where it landed, breathing heavily and her heart hammering in her chest. She'd never been more terrified, even when surrounded by a horde of turtles on Pararakelse. But it hadn't been the monster that frightened her, it had been her inability to sense it. To sense anything.

She turned sharply at a rustling behind her, and nearly dropped her sword. A second drawback to the loss of her senses, she'd been unable to tell how powerful the monster had been, and as such misjudged the strength of her blow. The attack that should have killed it only seemed to have angered it.

The creature had stood up and turned to glower at her. For a moment they just stood there, but then the creature struck once more. Without the spear, it moved even more swiftly and Motoko had no time to move. Before the blow landed, she brought her sword up and braced it against her other arm, so that the brunt of the attack was absorbed by the blade. This would have been fine to survive, but the sheer force of the the blow sent her reeling, flying backwards through the air until she struck a tree.

All the breath was forced from her lungs, and as she slid towards the ground her vision swam. She collapsed into a sitting position as the monster retrieved its spear. Her sight wavered, giving her the feeling of being on a ship in rough seas. The beast moved slowly, deliberately, knowing full well that this silly girl who had wandered across its path could no longer fight back. As it approached, Motoko reached feebly for her sword, but a wave of nausea forced her to stop. She began to hear the tinkling of bells and then she knew the end was coming.

"Kei...taro..."

The sound of bells suddenly intensified and as it did, a ball of light flashed past above Motoko's head and struck the monster in the face. The monster stumbled backward and began swatting at the light like it was an annoying fly. Amongst the tinkling of the bells, Motoko's consciousness began to fade. The last thing she saw before everything went black was a blur of green and steel rushing past her on her left, coupled with a loud battle cry.

-//-

Motoko awoke some time later, looking at firelight flickering underneath the leaves of the tree above her. For a moment she could not remember where she was or what had happened, but the tingling feeling in her legs reminded her. She sat up with a start, and a stabbing pain in her side caused her to gasp in pain.

"Oh!" With the odd tinkling sound, Motoko saw that floating ball of light come up in front of her face. "You're awake!" it said. "You should rest more. He's not back yet."

Motoko stared in confusion. Was this little ball of light talking to her? "H-he?"

The light bobbed. "Yep."

As Motoko stared at it, she began to realize that not only was the light talking to her, it wasn't just a light at all. It was a tiny girl, post-pubescent, wearing straps of cloth wrapped around her body. The fluttering, tinkling noise Motoko kept hearing was coming from the wings on the girl's back that were holding her aloft. The soft pink glow did not come from her body, but rather seemed to be simply surrounding her like an aura.

As Motoko tried to wrap her mind around this information, her injury caught up with her again and she passed out.

She had a strange dream again. This time she was standing in a forest clearing. Some fifteen feet ahead of her floated a small green and yellow object and as she watched, it came closer. When it came close enough to see more clearly, Motoko saw that it was actually Tama-chan, the Hinata House's resident flying hot spring turtle.

Motoko stiffened, her fear rising, desperately wanting to flee but unable to do so.

When Tama-chan came close enough for Motoko to reach out and touch had she the desire, there was a swirl of colors and a gust of wind which transformed the turtle into the tiny winged girl she'd seen earlier.

The girl hovered for a moment before speaking. "Almost time," she said.

Motoko heard rustling and a twig cracking, and then her eyes snapped open. Her mind was foggy and her vision blurry, but she turned her head to see if she could find the source of the sound.

The glow from the fire was fading, but in the light that remained, Motoko could see the figure of a man crouching by the fire pit, unloading the contents of a satchel. Motoko watched for a while before she fell unconscious again.

The next thing she knew, she was being shaken back into consciousness. Blinking groggily and noting that her pain had dulled, Motoko looked up into the face of the person who had been shaking her.

He was a startlingly handsome young man who couldn't have been much older than her, with dazzling blue eyes and long blond hair. The fringe of his hair fell to either side of his face; the rest of his hair was tucked into the hat he was wearing. Two things she noticed most clearly, however, were his ears. They were very long, and rather pointy, and stuck out away from his head.

Motoko broke of her stare and turned her attention to the vial he was holding. It was steaming slightly and contained a thick, viscous-looking red liquid.

"Let me help you up."

Motoko returned her attention to the man as he slipped his arm around her shoulders to bring her up to a sitting position. He held the vial up towards her mouth, but she put a hand on his arm. "Wait... Wha...?"

"Go ahead, drink it. If I had wished you harm I would have left you where I found you." Motoko could see the sincerity in his eyes, and given the condition she was in, she could think of no reason she should resist him. She dropped her arm and drank from the vial. "You'll feel better," he said. "I assure you."

The warm liquid flowed down her throat, the sensation soothing. As the concoction entered her system, she felt her energy returning and her pain fading. Within mere moments, Motoko felt more awake and alert than she ever had at the height of her ability back home. If she could recover her senses with this energy...

She stood up swiftly, and her new "friend" followed. "What was that liquid?" she asked.

"Healing potion, highly concentrated. It took me a while to find the Chu jelly I needed to brew it, so I was beginning to worry I might not make it in time to save you."

Motoko turned away, her face warming. "I should have been able to save myself..." But then she looked up suddenly, startled. "My sword! Where is it?"

"Ah." He turned back towards the fire and produced the Hina blade from where it lay leaning up against a tree. "A finely crafted blade, but of a kind I've never encountered before." He handed her the sword, then watched as she replaced it to her obi.

Motoko stood thoughtfully for a moment before she spoke next. "That creature... What was it?" When she looked at him, she noticed for the first time the equipment he was carrying.

He had a sword rigged for an over-the-shoulder draw strapped to his back and a belt with several pouches and satchels slung about his waist. A large, metal shield was off to the side, leaned up against a tree like Motoko's sword had been. The swordsman caught her eye, and she focused on him.

"It was a... moblin..." He looked at her closely. "I thought you simply looked peculiar, but... you're not from around here, are you?"

"I..." Motoko looked him in the eyes. "I am not from this world..." She turned away. "I do not know what this world is in relation to my own."

"Hmm..." He moved and sat by the fire, motioning for her to follow. "What is your name, Otherworlder?"

"I am... I am called Motoko Aoyama." She sat across the fire from him and bowed. "It is an honor to meet you."

He seemed momentarily flustered by her sudden formality. "Er..." He inclined his head. "I'm Link." There was a pause. "Is it... is it customary where you come from to be so formal?"

Motoko nodded. "It is how I was raised, at least." She tilted her head quizzically. "Are you simply called 'Link'? No family name?"

He shook his head. "I've always gone by just 'Link'." He shrugged.

Motoko jumped as the girl with the wings flashed past. "And her?"

She floated right up in front of Motoko's face and raised her hand as if in greeting. "I'm Teela! Pleased to meetcha!'

Motoko watched her wings flutter and looked at the smile on her face, and as she did so she began to feel better. However... "Please, forgive my rudeness, but... What manner of being are you, Teela?"

There girl seemed confused, the color of her glow shifting through several shades of pink. She fluttered around Motoko's head slowly. "Aren't there fairies where you come from?"

Motoko watched her closely. "I've... never seen one." Teela floated back to Link and sat down on top of his head. "Nothing like you, anyway."

"I think I should explain a few things about Hyrule, this land, before we leave these woods."

Motoko nodded. "I believe I'm going to need your help in this world."

He smiled. "First: about these woods..."


End file.
